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WAR IN AFGHANISTAN

U.S. major general killed by gunman

Man in Afghan uniform wounds 15, many of them Americans

Enlarge ImageRequest to buy this photoMassoud Hossaini | AP photoA soldier in a NATO convoy leaving Camp Qargha in Afghanistan fires an apparent warning shot in the vicinity of Associated Press journalists and pedestrians. The incident occurred amid tensions after a mass shooting inside the compound west of Kabul.

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KABUL, Afghanistan — An American major general was shot to death yesterday in one of the
bloodiest insider attacks of the long Afghanistan war.

A gunman dressed as an Afghan soldier turned on allied troops, wounding about 15, including a
German general and two Afghan generals.

The American officer was Army Maj. Gen. Harold Greene, a U.S. official said. An engineer by
training, Greene was on his first deployment to a war zone and was involved in preparing Afghan
forces for the time when U.S.-coalition troops leave at the end of this year.

Greene is the highest-ranking American officer killed in combat in the nation’s post-9/11 wars
in Iraq and Afghanistan and the highest-ranking officer killed in combat since 1970 in the Vietnam
War.

Five major generals were killed in Vietnam.

The attack at Marshal Fahim National Defense University, west of Kabul, underscored the tensions
that persist as the U.S. combat role winds down in Afghanistan — and it wasn’t the only assault by
an Afghan ally on coalition forces yesterday. In eastern Paktia province, an Afghan police guard
exchanged fire with NATO troops near the governor’s office, provincial police said. The guard was
killed in the gunfight.

Early indications suggested that the Afghan gunman who killed the American general was inside a
building and fired indiscriminately from a window at the people gathered outside, the U.S. official
said. There was no indication that Greene was targeted, said the official who identified
Greene.

A U.S. official said that of the estimated 15 people wounded, about half were Americans, and
several of them were in serious condition.

Despite the attacks, U.S. officials asserted confidence in their partnership with the Afghan
military, which appears to be holding its own against the Taliban but will have to operate
independently once most U.S.-led coalition forces leave at the end of the year.

The Iraq and Afghanistan wars have taken more than 6,700 U.S. lives.

Insider attacks rose sharply in 2012: More than 60 coalition troops — most of them Americans —
were killed in 40-plus attacks.

The White House said President Barack Obama was briefed on the shooting. Obama and Defense
Secretary Chuck Hagel both spoke with Gen. Joseph Dunford, the top U.S. general in Kabul. Dunford
said a joint U.S.-Afghan investigation is underway, and he assured his bosses that he retains
confidence in the Afghan military.

The Pentagon’s press secretary, Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby, said the general and other officials
were on a routine visit to the military university on a base west of Kabul.

Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, a spokesman for Afghanistan’s Defense Ministry, said a “terrorist in
an army uniform” fired on both Afghan and international troops. Azimi and U.S. officials said the
shooter was killed.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid, in a statement, praised the “Afghan soldier” who carried
out the attack. He did not claim that the Taliban carried out the attack, although in the past the
Taliban have encouraged such actions.

The site of the attack is part of a military compound known as Camp Qargha, sometimes called “
Sandhurst in the Sand”— referring to a famed British military academy — because British forces
oversaw the construction of the officer school and the creation of its training program.

Soldiers were tense immediately after the shooting. One soldier in a NATO convoy leaving Camp
Qargha fired an apparent warning shot in the vicinity of both Associated Press journalists in a car
and pedestrians.

No one was wounded.

In western Afghanistan yesterday, a NATO helicopter strike targeting missile-launching Taliban
militants killed four civilians, an Afghan official said. NATO said it is investigating.